On Tuesday, Algerian military security services arrested Sahrawi activist Karama Daych Moulay Ali at the entrance of Tindouf and took him to an unknown destination, the same sources said, quoting eyewitnesses. 

Moulay Ali's family, from the Rguibate-Souaed tribe, asked the Polisario leadership to clarify the circumstances of his arrest and disappearance, but it denied having any connection with the incident. 

Tindouf security officials, in turn, denied the arrest of the Sahrawi activist, who is believed to belong to a Polisario dissident movement, known as Khat Chahid (line of the martyr). Its members have been subject, for several months, to unprecedented surveillance in the Tindouf camps. 

Last week, two members of Khat Chahid, namely Chafai Ali and Bachir Lmouahed, were approached in the desert by a "Polisario" patrol while they were heading for the camps of Tindouf on board a 4WD vehicle. 

The patrol relieved Ali and Lmouahed of their car and personal belongings and abandoned them in the desert with no food or water. The two militants had to walk 40 km to reach Tmimichate in Mauritania and take the train for Nouadhibou where they live.